


Redamancy

by captainkippen



Series: JATP Appreciation Week 2020 [6]
Category: Julie and The Phantoms (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, jatp appreciation week
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-07
Updated: 2020-11-07
Packaged: 2021-03-09 02:14:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,285
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27427024
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/captainkippen/pseuds/captainkippen
Summary: Day 6: Write a fic with your favourite fanfiction trope.Redamancy – noun: The act of loving in return.Written forJulie and the Phantoms Appreciation Week 2020.
Relationships: Julie Molina/Luke Patterson
Series: JATP Appreciation Week 2020 [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1993720
Comments: 13
Kudos: 290
Collections: JATP Appreciation Week, oh YES





	Redamancy

**Author's Note:**

> You can find me on tumblr at [captainkippen](https://captainkippen.tumblr.com/).

_**Redamancy** – noun: The act of loving in return._

Luke’s life ended and began with the convergence of two moments in time; his last breath taken in 1995 and his first exhale of the new millennium. There were steps in between, of course. It was impossible to erase that dark hour in the windowless room of the in-between, Alex’s tears staining the sleeves of his hoodie and Reggie’s ashen-faced shock etched into his memory for good, and sometimes when his mind wandered it brought him back to that traumatic ride in the ambulance where he felt his soul detach from his body for good. However, even with the discomfort of the transition, he felt strangely grateful. 

At first, he had assumed it to be a terrible injustice. Three young men, all with full lives of adventure and wonder ahead of them, lost to the passage of time. Never would they live up to their own expectations, or become the legends he’d known they would, and never would they prove their parents wrong.

He’d been mistaken.

The boys were not lost, and while they might not have the most conventional lives ahead of them it didn’t mean that there was no adventure or wonder to come. No, his fears had been thwarted the moment Julie Molina stepped into their world. She had been all they needed.

In fact, he’d been so grateful for the distraction she brought that, at first, he didn’t even notice the appearance of the mark.

“What are you watching?” Julie asked, leaning over to peer at the laptop screen. 

Luke had gotten a lot better at interacting with physical objects lately. It was even easier when Julie was nearby – Carlos had some kind of theory about Julie being a ‘conduit’ between the band and the living world, it involved a lot of physics and math that he didn’t understand, but they’d yet to find any solid answers on the situation. If they were honest, they’d all admit that they weren’t really looking for answers, they didn’t seem necessary. Things worked the way they were and that didn’t need to change. 

“Just checking the views on YouTube,” he replied. “Did you know people in _Russia_ can watch our videos?”

He caught a whiff of her strawberry scented perfume as she hooked her chin over his shoulder and had to stop himself from taking a deep breath in. The mark on his collarbone tingled a little.

It was an unusual addition to his skin, and he often found himself tracing a finger over it when he alone. Soulmarks were a complicate mystery at the best of times, but Luke had to admit this one had him more confused than most. See, when he had been fourteen years old, starting high school for the first time and terrified because of it, he had gained the first (and what he honestly thought would be the last) of his soulmarks. They came in a pair. Two twisting knots at the base of his neck – they matched perfectly with those of the two boys he met his first day in music class. He, Alex, and Reggie had been born to love one another. Platonic soulmates were not uncommon, and he had been ecstatic to find them. Luke had never believed he could be the kind of person to get a mark, let alone two, but fate had proved him wrong.

With Julie, fate had absolutely knocked him on his ass. It was large than the two for the guys, sweeping down across his collarbone in elegant lines, deep and unmovable. The thing was, as with platonic marks, unmatched soulmarks were not uncommon either, and Luke could definitely believe that if he were to get a mark it would be unmatched. He’d been lucky with his first two, he reasoned, so really he shouldn’t so surprised that when the mark for Julie appeared it would go unnoticed and unreciprocated by her. Especially considering she was alive and he, well, _wasn’t._

C’est la vie, or whatever, he thought. He had accepted it. That didn’t mean it didn’t break him a little inside when she came near enough to make the lines itch.

“How long have you been online?” she asked.

About six hours.

“...not long.”

Julie’s eyes narrowed. He’d been caught in his lie. It was a familiar dance, the way she lunged for the computer and he shielded it with his body, snatching it up and away from her.

“Give me the laptop!”

“No!” he laughed, lifting it up and out of her reach.

She clawed at him, grappling at the fabric of his shirt as she tried to pull him back down to her level, and then she froze. 

“What–” he started, before realising what she was looking at.

Where she’d tugged his shirt down, the collar had slipped back to reveal the portion of his collarbone decorated in that intricate ink. Hastily, he shrugged away and righted himself, but it was too late.

“You have a Soulmark,” she said. “I didn’t know ghosts could have Soulmarks.”

He shuffled his feet uncomfortably.

“Well, I was alive before, you know.”

“It’s still black though. How is it still black?”

When somebody’s soulmate died, a Soulmark would turn white like a faded scar. It would make sense to assume when somebody who had a Soulmark died, that Soulmark would turn white to match their partner’s. It also made sense to assume dead people didn’t get new marks. Luke probably would have assumed that, if he didn’t have the physical evidence disproving it on his skin right now.

“Guess my soulmate’s still alive somewhere,” he said, avoiding her gaze.

“Luke…”

He didn’t expect her to catch his face in her hands, gently cradling him to look him in the eye, and he certainly didn’t expect what happened next.

She yanked down the collar of her own shirt. The black lines ran down from the edge of her shoulder to the top of her sternum, twisting around one another in intricate knots, a familiar pattern. 

“It showed up the day I met you,” she said. “I thought it was just a coincidence at first, you know… sometimes that happens. But I can feel it every time I’m near you.”

Luke reached out a hand, hesitating for a second, and then at Julie’s nod, he ran a gentle fingertip along the middle line. The feeling was unlike anything before. A channel seemed to open up between them, bright and golden, filled with every piece of their hearts, entangling them.

Luke’s own mark seemed to sing in relief. _Home,_ it said, _I am home._

“I didn’t think it was possible for you to have a mark,” she said. “I would’ve said something sooner.”

Awestruck, Luke jerked his head in a way he hoped communicated ‘wow, me too, we’re kind of dumb, huh?’

“I’ve got two for Reggie and Alex,” she continued, a little breathless. “At the base of my neck. I can feel those too, but neither of them ever mentioned anything and… it’s not the same feeling. With this one, it’s like…” 

“Knowing,” he finished.

She nodded, eyes wide.

They all matched, a fact which they would realise later, with the two platonic knots at the base of each neck. Alex’s and Reggie’s had gone unnoticed in the absence of the usual human things like showering, and their accepted love for Julie had meant they had not itched.

It wasn’t often that Luke was struck speechless – an event that Alex would remark he was sorry to miss – but at that moment no words came to him. There was only silence and Julie, and the threads of time and space that pulled them together.

_Redamancy._

  
  
  
  
  



End file.
